![Sample our Law journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5942/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Law.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
The federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA) includes children who are sexually exploited for commercial purposes in its definition of human trafficking victims. However, most states criminalize sex trafficked minors for prostitution. Despite this tension, little research exists on variation in state-level child sex trafficking statutes. Studying this legislation is necessary because state-level statutes often determine if children are treated as criminals or victims. Local law enforcement and service providers interact with this population more often than federal officials. This mixed methods study uses Event History Analysis and interviews with anti-criminalization advocates, state legislators, state legislative aides, and state prosecutors to examine social, economic, and political factors associated with legislative decisions prohibiting the arrest and/or prosecution of sexually exploited minors for prostitution. Statistical analyses suggest that states with a higher prevalence of concentrated disadvantage are more likely to criminalize this population. Similarly, participants in qualitative interviews describe conditions of structural economic inequality as a primary risk factor for child sex trafficking. For that reason, addressing socio-economic factors such as jobs, wages, and housing are essential for preventing minors from being commercially sexually exploited, and, as a result, being criminalized. Theoretical implications and policy recommendations are also discussed.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. For the purposes of this study, “non-criminalization” refers to states that neither arrest nor prosecute children (anyone under 18) for prostitution, and “partial non-criminalization” refers to states that arrest but do not prosecute minors for prostitution. Conversely, “full criminalization” refers to states that retain the right to arrest and prosecute children for prostitution.
2. Concentrated disadvantage is operationalized in this study as a summary variable combining the percentage of people living in poverty, percentage of individuals on public assistance, percentage of female-headed households, percentage of unemployed, percentage of people less than age 18, and households with people under age 18 (Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs, Citation2013). The index chosen for this study excludes race, unlike Wilson’s (Citation2012) original conception of concentrated disadvantage, to focus on children and the feminization of poverty, which are central to CSEC.
3. The full quantitative analyses include seventeen independent variables associated with CSEC legislation, including presence of a statewide human trafficking task force, proportion of GOP state legislators, percentage of female state legislators, number of children in foster care, number of incarcerated minors, and the state per capita number of anti-CSEC NGOs. (See, for a description of all independent variables.)
4. This timeframe was chosen as New York was the first state to introduce CSEC full non-criminalization legislation in 2007. While the proposed measure was not adopted in New York, the state did pass some CSEC protective laws in 2008, thus prompting additional states follow suit over the next five years.
5. Event History Analysis is the terminology used for survival analyses in the field of sociology.
6. Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, and Texas have been omitted from all analyses in 2008, 2010, 2012, 2014, and 2016 as they are not “at risk” of passing legislation when not in session. These biennial state legislatures are only in session every other year.
7. States may remain at risk of passing additional legislation reducing criminalization of CSEC, but these analyses focus on the factors shaping states’ initial legislative actions in this policy area.
8. A Z-score is the number of standard deviations from the mean value of zero in the reference population. For the concentrated disadvantage index in this study, the maximum average z-score is 1.60, or 1.60 standard deviations above the mean of 0, indicating the state with the highest value on the concentrated disadvantage index in the U.S. The minimum average z-score is −1.33.
9. Kentucky simultaneously passed “arrest, no prosecute” legislation and legislatively mandated the creation of a statewide human trafficking task force in 2013.
10. The huge coefficients on these variables are a consequence of the fact that the passage of legislation prohibiting the prosecution of sexually exploited minors for prostitution was very rare in the years 2008–2009 (the reference category).
11. The poverty rate and public assistance variables were very highly correlated with one another so they are present in the model combined in a poverty index.
12. In 2009 DOJ began funding task forces to bring together victim service organizations and federal, state, and local law enforcement to facilitate prosecution of multidistrict sex trafficking cases. Task forces provide an institutional point of focus for anti-CSEC and anti-trafficking advocates, criminal justice agents, and NGOs, as well as an additional venue for state legislation diffusion.
13. The following quote references adult women, not children. We did confirm with the participant that they also see the same disparity between the criminalizing children of color and white children since this is a study on the commercial sexual exploitation of children.